there to love her. Her only alternative was Ben, whose possessiveness and need to be loved could be just the tool she needed to protect herself and her unborn child.
Jocelyn stopped and stared up at the cloudless sky, watching several crows take flight as something spooked them. Would Ben still want her if he knew she was with child? Would he be able to get past the circumstances surrounding its conception? As with Greg, she could tell Ben her husband had drowned, legitimizing her pregnancy, but the truth had a way of coming out. She couldn’t build a life on a lie, nor could she repay Ben’s love with counterfeit coin.
She tried to imagine Ben’s hands on her body, his lips on hers. She harbored no romantic feelings for him. Could she grow to love him for the sake of her baby and their future? Funny how she was so protective of this child. Would she love it once it was born? Would she be able to see it simply as her baby, and not his child? Would she be able to mold it into a good human being, someone kind and noble? Someone like Derek, her mind unhelpfully supplied.
Ben is kind and noble, Jocelyn argued with herself. Ben will love us. She knew she was trying to convince herself, to justify an act of indecency against another human being, one whose weakness she would be forced to exploit if she grew desperate enough.
“God forgive me for what I mean to do,” Jocelyn said into the silence around her.
She turned for home, having made up her mind. Her steps were plodding, her heart heavy. Some part of her wished she’d told Derek the whole truth rather than the scrubbed version she’d offered up to protect those she’d promised not to betray. But in the end, it didn’t matter. She was responsible for what had happened to her, and now she’d have to pay the price.
Chapter 41
October 1776
New York City
It was about a week after the theaters had been shut down by the occupiers that Richard Kinney came to see Jocelyn at her lodging house. New York was still recovering from the great fire that had consumed a quarter of the city only a few weeks before and had resulted in numerous injuries and deaths. There was an acrid smell of soot in the air that turned Jocelyn’s stomach, not only because the stench seemed to cling to just about everything but because it reminded her of how close she’d come to losing her own modest home. She had watched in horror, too frightened to go to sleep, as an orange glow lit up the sky, the hungry, crackling tongues of flame reaching ever closer and devouring everything in their path. Thankfully, she still had a place to call home, but she was acutely aware of the impermanence of her position.
Richard Kinney was a stocky man with ginger hair and soulful blue eyes. In his mid-forties, he was married, had two teenage daughters, and owned a printshop on William Street. Being something of a theater enthusiast, Mr. Kinney considered himself a patron of the arts and had printed leaflets and posters for the various performances free of charge. In exchange for this service, he liked to have a drink with the actors after a performance and sometimes asked to be permitted to watch a dress rehearsal. Jocelyn had no idea what he might want with her now that the theater was closed.
She received Mr. Kinney in the tiny parlor reserved for visitors and invited him to sit, taking a seat opposite him in a worn armchair. “How have you been keeping, Mr. Kinney?” she asked.
“Very well, thank you, Mistress Sinclair.” He glanced toward the open door and lowered his voice. “What do you mean to do now that the theater is closed?” he asked.
“Look for a domestic situation, one that offers room and board,” Jocelyn replied, wondering why he should care. “I can’t afford to remain here past the first of the month.”
“What would you say if I offered to help you secure such a position?” Richard Kinney asked.
“Are you looking to hire a maidservant, Mr. Kinney?”
“Not exactly.” He glanced toward the door again, but the lodging house was silent, all the women currently at work, and Mrs. Blunt, who owned the establishment, at the market, as was her daily custom.
“Look, Mistress Sinclair, I won’t beat about the bush. I know you’re no royalist. I’ve heard you express your opinions on